Simons told KSL: "Everyone on Facebook's been posting posters like, 'One million likes and I get a puppy', and I thought, 'Hey, these are getting shared around. I've seen kids get likes and get a puppy, so I should probably give it a shot'."

The Facebook picture was liked by more than 15,000 people and shared more than 160,000 times.

Just a couple of days later, she found her birth mother.

"She was just very surprised," said Simons. "It was kind of intermittent messaging each other, but she said she told her extended family, and they were all completely ecstatic that I had gotten hold of her."